Healthcare providers still monitor patients’ vital signs the same way they did more than 50 years ago—creating considerable room for improvement. Implementing wireless and wearable continuous patient monitoring, in fact, enables health systems and hospitals to improve the overall experience for patients and their families, increase confidence among clinicians that they are making decisions based on the most relevant and actionable data possible, empowering them to focus on the patients who need it most, all while reducing the cognitive burden on nurses and physicians.

In this conversation, Bernd Saugel, MD and Stephanie Kovalick discuss the benefits of augmenting current spot check monitoring protocols with wireless and wearable continuous patient monitoring tools.

Perioperative patient safety and post-operative ward monitoring is an important topic. Could continuous monitoring potentially improve patient outcomes and reduce rapid response team activations? Can 24/7 monitoring for high-risk patients provide meaningful data and improve patient safety? With a focus upon “meaningful”, how do we avoid alarm fatigue? Where is the research and what do the data tell us?

Patient monitoring has made some significant strides forward over the last decade. Nowadays most people are familiar with the idea. Where are we now with this essential aspect of healthcare? How far should we take the commitment to monitoring a patient? What about “wearable” technology both inside and outside the institution?

Desiree Chappell speaks with Meera Joshi, Specialist registrar at Ashford and St Peter's Hospital NHS Foundation Trust and clinical research fellow in the department of surgery cancer at Imperial College London.